I feel slightly worn.

Just received news my cousin had a baby just a week ago. Heh, he’s a cute little thing. It’s a joyous occasion and meant for celebration. How the world has changed, and everyone is so far apart with relatives in Malaysia and Australia, and me being in NY, one does not get all the attention they used to.

My uncles and aunts say they used to remember when I was ‘this’ tall. That’s when they were dating and they’d see me on occasion. I don’t recall any of that, but they said I was cute, and I’ll just have to take their word for it.

I still recall as a kid, feeling a baby kick when one of my aunts was pregnant. This was on my birthday, when my entire extended family (all the relatives on my mom’s side) went to Fraser’s Hill for a daytrip. We had a picnic by the waterfall. I can’t recall, I was maybe around 10? Heh, it’s a strange feeling and a strange bond towards a new member of the family when they come into the world.

I remember fondly of my aunts walking me to kindergarten, and walking me home. As a 4 year old, I recalled my aunt came late once and I was wailing while the teacher waited with me. All the other kids had gone home and it’s a prompt affair where as soon as kindergarten is over, the kids will go and I was left all alone with my teacher and a few others. I felt so alone and I lived only 5 minutes walk away but when you are a kid, if there is no one to look out for you, you do feel scared. Somehow I feel fortunate, that so many people loved me and took care of me.

My grandmother and uncle’s family used to stay next door to where I lived in Malaysia. As semi detached houses, I could prance up and down between houses. My memories are all focused on the kitchen areas, where I still recall my grandmother and aunts making ‘bak zhang’ where there were ingredients stacked up and down and they’d deftly make a cone shape with some leaves and fill it up with rice and soy beans and meat and salted eggs etc before covering it and tying it up with strings. I also recall accidentally breaking one of my grandma’s eggs and you could see the mess of yoke and shell on the floor. Heh, my mom told me to apologize, which I did, and was very sorry that I broke the egg. I don’t even remember how or why I was handling the egg. Heh, my grandmother didn’t get angry and swallowed me whole, well, not that I recall anyway.

I also remember a few years later when my uncle’s family had moved out to his current place, which is a three storey shop lot where the top two levels could be used for residential purposes. I still remember the place when they just moved there and it was messy with lots of cleaning up to do and just a lone fluorescent lamp in the corner. I spent many holidays in my uncle’s shop, tagging prices on paint cans, screwdrivers, silicone guns, super glue, different nails, bolts, nuts etc. I’d always end up greasy and tired at the end but I’d be contented. Heh, I still remember one time when I had to put a roll of string onto a spindle. It got all tangled up and I ended up bringing the whole spindle and roll of rope home where my mom had to untangle it as I could not figure head or tail out of it

I am one of those people who have the worst memory and probably don’t remember too many things that happened in my life unless I slowly think back and start recollecting the images. Somehow I grew up and ended up doing pretty ok in life. I am grateful for my mom and my family and all their individual contributions to who I am today.

Heh, it just occurred to me that I have a nephew now? I’m an uncle I think, and probably half an old fart now. It just occurred to me and I hope that he grows up with the same loving and caring from his family, to someday, maybe reflect like how I’m doing now, and having fond memories, thinking it was good.